Total pages in book: 145
Estimated words: 148397 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 148397 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
An enemy’s hands.
A splicing vision settled over my eyes, replaying a piece of my past.
I’d seen this before.
Seen my boyish hand landing on the bare ass of one of our mothers. It blended with my own larger one as I reached for Rachel against my will.
I’d never been able to say no.
I’d screamed the first few times.
I’d fought his hold as he made me abuse them.
I’d tried to shut down, but he soon learned how to keep me present.
Kind words, nice praise, sweet encouragements.
Love.
Motherfucking love had shackled me to such atrocities.
“That’s it, Onn Ree. She’s all yours. They’re all yours. Do you like it?”
“That’s it, mon ami.” Victor’s voice rearranged my memories, inserting himself into them, replacing the role of my sadistic father. “Get your cock out and stick it in her.”
The noise of my zipper as I shoved my pants down merged with the sobs I’d made as a little boy, forced by his father to do such unspeakable things.
The similarities. The sickening déjà vu.
“Good boy, Onn Ree.”
I fisted myself with a quaking hand.
“Do it, Mercer.”
I choked as I notched inside a woman I didn’t want.
“All the way now.”
“You’re doing so well, my son…”
“Thrust, Henri.”
“Thrust, Onn Ree.”
My chin sank onto my chest as I pushed.
I didn’t feel a damn thing.
I checked out.
Went numb.
I’d forgotten for a reason.
I’d forgotten because I couldn’t survive.
The nausea in my stomach as I threw up the rich chocolate cake my father had given me the first time I’d drawn blood. The trembles and shakes as he came for me again and again. The horrors as he tried to make my prepubescent body come. The absolute despair as he taught me how to swing a flogger—
“My turn.” Victor let out a roar as he mounted Ily in front of me.
She cried out.
Her eyes snapped closed.
And that was the moment my entire existence shattered.
I didn’t help her.
I failed her.
Trapped in the past.
Shackled by the boy I’d been.
A boy who’d watched so many women being raped.
A boy who’d been forced to watch and never interfere until it was his turn.
And I couldn’t do it.
Couldn’t cope.
Not anymore.
Not now.
Not again.
My body and heart didn’t break, but my mind?
It snapped like a rubber band.
I flatlined—
Chapter Twenty-Three
………………………….
Ily
I FLOATED ABOVE THE CASTLE.
The stars twinkled in all their might. The Milky Way splashed across the sky like a pathway to better days. And the moon played peek-a-boo behind wispy silvery clouds.
So beautiful.
So perfect.
So pure.
I lay on my back beneath all of the night’s glory and didn’t watch.
Didn’t watch.
Back there in reality, my body rocked with his every thrust.
Back there in hell, I felt him sliding inside me, deeper and harder, rocking me forward and back, forward and back, all while I fought to stay on all fours.
It didn’t hurt.
But it did destroy me.
But I didn’t watch, so it didn’t matter.
It didn’t matter as he picked up his pace and fisted my hips to pump harder.
It didn’t matter he took my body against my will.
I was free of him.
Free of Victor. Of Henri. Of nightmares.
My fingers might be entwined with Rachel’s as we faced each other. Our breath might mingle with every vicious thrust, our lips near enough to kiss. She might rock in the same primal rhythm, driven forward and back by my twin flame as he made love to her.
But it wasn’t real.
It wasn’t love.
It was rape on both their accounts.
Every facet of Henri was dead. His face, his eyes, his energy.
He thrust like a robot, blank stare, and hollow heart.
The man I’d accepted as mine no longer lived inside that shell.
He was free like me…detached and dissociated from reality.
But what was reality?
Could the freedom and light I floated in be our true reality, while down there, where everything was evil and hardship, the illusion?
A dream.
Nothing but a hologram, a hallucination, something that would end and fade.
I floated around the gargoyles and angels of Victor’s parapets as he used me. I disassociated all over again and sank into a mediative calmness unlike anything I’d ever experienced.
Golden light enveloped me, blocking out all sights and sounds and senses.
It cradled me until I lost all touch with my mortal body; I hovered in ultimate freedom.
A part of me knew it couldn’t last.
Beauty and wonder such as this could never exist forever.
But while it did, I was grateful.
So grateful to find a way to be untouchable all while being touched. Protected all while being used. I no longer sensed Henri or Rachel. No longer suffered hate or fear or pain.
Wisdom that didn’t come from me blanketed my entire soul, wrapping me up in protection full of forgiveness, courage, and truth.
Time drifted without me under its influence.
Days could’ve passed.
Weeks.
And my golden light didn’t falter.
But then…finally, a feathering tug from my body to my soul.
A fishing hook digging into my spirit, reeling me back on a nylon line I couldn’t escape.